#I have a ton of art in my drafts that I have yet to post

[ricky-mortis]

They're the best of each other!

[candyunicornsateme]

Anyone ever just think of random fucking dialogue and jokes and random shit between characters?? The amount of goofy ass otp banters and shit I have drafted is embarrassing. What am I going to do with that?? Make them comics or fics??? Bitch. 

[justskyla-art]

asunder

(name: alaine corman - title: "the burning" - pronouns: they/them)

[fudgelling-away]

I am posting a WIP to share how happy I am that I've made that reference pic for Sans. It was a pain but it was worth it. It really is useful. I hope it will help me keep his appearance consistent for at least some time.

As you can see, drawing his belly was not enough to satisfy my simping needs, no... I had to lift his shirt up... heheh. I just cannot control myself.

Other than becoming more unhinged in my obsession, it feels like I started to make some progress in art. Learning how to draw properly is very hard for me because I am mentally exhausted after my office work. It's a very fast-paced, difficult job. After hours of problem solving I am left with no strength and no desire to learn anything new. All I want is to... do nothing and just rest, really, but I force myself to keep being creative. I cannot force myself to properly study drawing, though. That would be too much and I have no space for another mental load to bear.

That being said, I still feel like I am making some progress. And I am happy, and that's what matters. Right now I am working on a reference sheet for expressions, as well as drawing his skull from different perspectives. That's a lot of fun and it's not nearly as frustrating as I thought it would be.

Also, I am trying to become active on AO3. I've recently realised that I talk about my favourite fics all the time but I am yet to leave a single comment. That is shameful and that's going to change. I will do better.

Other than that, I am focusing on finishing some of my ficlets, but English has become weirdly difficult for me these days. Not just English, actually. I don't know why. Everything I say feels wrong. The sentences I build feel... off. I have no idea what's up with that. It's possible that it's the lack of a proper sleeping schedule. I hope it will pass eventually. It's horribly frustrating.

I hope you all are doing well! I have seen tons of your pictures that I plan to reblog and comment on (about 50 are waiting in my drafts). I have fics waiting in a queue to be read. There is so much art everywhere... Thank you, Sans simp community, for being so awesome.

[safe-from-sharp-teeth]

Ayo! I haven't answered asks in FOREVER, so it's time for some spring cleaning :) Also answering other stuff, like what I've been up to.

If you sent an ask and it's not here, sorry! I may have deleted it because the prompt required too much work of me and I wasn't feeling it, or I was uncomfortable.

Let's gooooo !

Firstly - where have I been? Work REALLY picked up in a way I wasn't expecting over the last...4 months? I was working double and often triple the hours I was used to. With work, vacations, random illnesses, and many video games I got a bit too obsessed with, this blog took a backseat. Plus, sometimes I get disinterested in vore when obsessed with something else. Sometimes, that lasts months, and it did this time.

But now I can confirm that work will FINALLY chill for a long period of time. I'm free! And more motivated than ever! Wahoo! Thanks for your support ALWAYS.

Next big question - when am I going to do more of my story? The one with Asyr? AHHHHHGHHGHH this story has consumed my life. I think about it daily. I dream about it. And yet I'm not as comfortable writing as I am drawing, so writing is a slow process that my perfectionist ass struggles with. I can assure you that there is a story in the works - and I am working on it at a snail's pace.

Okay, ask time...

@ponyluvesonic09 AYO maybe I'll make a full ghost pred pros/con list for you, because that sounds awesome! Kir//by is one of the silliest canon preds out there. Honestly getting eaten by him would be like getting vored by a vacuum, LOL. Galaxy tummy!! Imagine a prey floating around in one of those item bubbles all grumpy. Thank u for the ask, this is good stuff.

no. ( /・・)ノ

UWAGHHHHH I LIKE HER!!! Never played O/verwat/ch but what a gem!! I have a random fondness for centaur-like preds nowadays. She looks so cozy. THANK U I LOVE HER!!!

@tiger9o0 I have not played r//ain w//orld or know what it's about, LOL. Looks like a platformer? Man, I'm terrrriiiiibblleee at those. But whoever this is on the cover, I LIKE EM. A+. (That might not answer ur question shdjbghkjg SORRY)

@heimkoheimkofan LOVE THAT I GOT THE ROBOT ENJOYERS AFTER THAT ONE POST....YES yall are so right and I'm so wrong for just hard metal robot tums. I will rectify my mistake soon I PROMISE. Also oh! You were the one asking about stomachs other than elemental ones! IVE HAD THAT IN MY DRAFTS FOREVER IM SORRY AHHHH. I REALLY love your imagination with tums and you've inspired me to think of some awesome environments! THANKS

@fastfur07 BWAH?? Ugh I'm all over the place when it comes to art. Some pieces take 30 min (like the zangooc I drew at the top of this post), most take 2 days. Some really hard drawings like my wolf bat creechur from a few months ago and my shrimp from last year took a month. THANK U??

We're going back so far that I think this is about my naga oc (which I'm in the midst of redesigning cough cough). For him, he would never tolerate being prey, extremely unwilling bahaha. In general, I haven't thought much about naga or snake prey! I get the appeal of slurping up a noodle, but I just prefer human prey :)

@fastfur07 you fiend, you always give me the best drawing ideas. UNFORTUNATELY, I didn't have time to draw something for this one. BUTTTT....

(i've had this next one in my drafts for forever)

then i had a silly comic. I'll post the wip here because I won't finish it, so enjoy bahaha.

@blizzaria123-blog THANK U im rapidly melting into a puddle from ur words

@mrpotatomanversionsix relevant. i will continue drawing them 4 u

?!??!!??!?!??!?!?!??!?!? how dare u enter my ask box with this blasphemy

@sfwsillynoms WAH!!! you!!! I'm currently redesigning my naga oc but when I finish I'll tag you, if you're still around! And he can 100% be drawn with ur preysona :)

@mystorl i am SO late to this, but SMART. I like it. I shall give my lil guy this friend. I just want to let u know that I see this and it's wonderful and I will do something abt it.

I remember this ask made me laugh a ton when I first got it. thank u. idk why I find this so funny

@sillylilprey IM CRYING RIGHT BACK AHHHH this is an ancient ask, but thank u! hope you're still enjoying!

@terrytheinsane finally, the last ask in my askbox. I love it. You have been wronged with how long it took me to answer you. I have gained knowledge from your ask. THANKS

AND THAT'S IT!! Thanks guys, I hope to make you proud! Feel free to send more asks, and hopefully I will answer in a TIMELY manner.

Goodnight! And remember: Nice Vore ᕕ༼⌐■-■༽ᕗ

[magic-is-something-we-create]

2023 recap + 2024 plans

i wrote 261,200 words in 2023; 172,500 of those for Whispers, 88,700 for Goddess-Touched!

i read 16 books to completion, beta'd for an additional 2, am currently reading 3, and got partway through 5 others before having to put them down.

i maintained my streaming schedule with only a handful of emergency-related exceptions, and drew, uh, a shit ton over the course of the year!

writing goals for 2024:

fix Echoseers (full stylistic rewrite, along with some plot tweaks)

finish the first draft of Goddess-Touched (and edit it hardcore as well)

work on as-yet-unnamed book 4 of tms

fix up Whispers with the added feedback of beta readers

start querying Whispers (i'll look into self publishing down the road if i don't end up finding an agent. the way my brain functions i must cling to the hope of not having to market it myself tooth and nail for the time being)

POTENTIALLY. if my brain fixates on it. write the script for The Lost so that i actually have something to work with to make the comic happen

one of my offline friends is starting to get into writing, and im hoping to help them through some of the early rough patches and potentially co-write a thing with them!!

i completely dropped the ball on the weekly writing updates so im gonna try and get back to that on wednesday. and potentially get back into the weekly ask games!

non-writing goals for 2024:

youtube. i want to make speedpaints and worldbuilding videos and shit. ive already made the basic animation stuff to have a lil sona to do the gesturing for me and i know how to make videos i just havent done it in a While

twitch!! i want to stream a bit more often because its fun and if i let myself branch out into video games as well as art itll be easier to do that. u might see me streaming in the evenings sometime soon. (psst im not streaming this weekend as im still doing a shit ton of holiday/social stuff but the weekend of the 13th ill be back to both patreon and twitch baybee)

SPEAKING OF i want to get my shit together enough to do like. monthly short story releases for my patrons/ko-fi members. early access, that is, so if i post one in january, it'll be posted here a month or two later for all to see/read

i want to read as many books as i did in 2023, if not more! im also considering adding book reviews/thoughts to youtube or patreon/ko-fi perks

my weekend hiatuses aren't going anywhere. having time where im not actively engaging with tumblr + don't feel obligated to do Anything online has done wonders for my mental health and i highly recommend it. focus mode on my phone and leechblock on desktop has helped so so so much

and that's all i'm sharing here!! i hope 2024 is a better year for all than the last <3

[moltengoldveins]

That TCU post…that is truly one of, if not the greatest thing I’ve ever seen come out of this fandom. I tried my own hand a while back at writing “the dsmp but taken seriously”; gave it a name and a playlist but didn’t really write much before I went back to my other projects. If you ever have the motivation to do more with that outline I’d be honored to be a co-writer or help out in any way, or if you want you could just use my title as a name for the series: A Ballad of Broken Dreams.

holy crap op this is so sweet. Thank you so much. I’m… wow ok. That. Wow. Thank you. That’s legitimately so kind and I’m so glad you enjoyed it XD. Id also Love to see your playlist and your thoughts behind the songs if you’re down?! That sounds awesome :D

funnily enough, I’ve had a drafted outline for this heccin thing running around in my head since the Butcher Army arc. Right around when SAD-ist dropped her animatic, I simultaneously realized ‘oh wow, I Adore this concept’ and ‘oh wow, I Highly doubt the CCs are gonna manage to do this the way I’d want to see it’ and lo and behold: I was correct. So painfully correct. (There were also People Involved whom I had Really Bad Feelings About from very early on that, sure enough, turned out to be exactly what i thought they were, rip) So the Emduo prequels, Icarus heccin Dying, and the end of Axe of Peace have been around for Ages.

I’d honestly love to do more with this concept, (i am designing movie posters as we speak) but due to Chronic Illness Pog I’m in a rather unstable financial situation? And don’t have a ton of free time for art. Any big projects are gonna take a While, or id need to find a way to use it or something adjacent to fund, y’know, Rent. That being said, I’m definitely writing the emduo prequels, both as movie scripts and as novels, as those are the films focused on, yknow, My Bois. I also think it’d be hilarious to release the novels and then the scripts and watch people Loose Their Minds over the ‘inaccurate adaptation >>:(‘

I’d absolutely love to work with other people in the fandom on this stuff, though I’ve never been the best at directly co-writing (my writing method and style is painfully specific (ie needlessly poetic) and I’m very autistic: I don’t like it when people touch that Specific Thing) but literally anything else? Im open ears. I love collabs.

and finally, I adore your name for the series, (excellent word choice there /srs, it fits perfectly with the symbolism of the whole story) and I think it works really Really well for the actual DSMP, but if I’m entirely honest… I’m not sure it fits the TCU? Like genuinely I’m so grateful for the suggestion, I love when people offer ideas and bounce things around like that. But one of the main things I tried to do with this concept was work out how the story could actually end Well. A deep-seated belief in the good-but-fallen nature of man, the importance of hope, and the inevitability of redemption kinda comes part and parcel with the whole Being-A-Christian Thing (if it doesn’t, you’re missing the Whole Point Of The Bible) and while the actual DSMP may have ended in broken dreams… this doesn’t. That was my first thought when writing that outline: This Is Going To End Well. Not for wish-fulfillment reasons, not because I’m naive or I don’t like bad endings, but because fundamentally, everything sad is a lie, and if the story has ended in tragedy, it hasn’t ended yet.

If I had to pick a series name now, I’m not sure what I’d pick. A part of me balks at referencing anything popularized by Our Local Redacted, but ‘unfinished symphony’ wasn’t his in the first place, it was from Hamilton. “The Finished Symphony” has a cool ring to it? I dunno. If anyone else has ideas please feel free to toss them in here aight, I’m not settling on anything for a While.

Anyways, thanks for Ted talking with me, drink water 💜

[thelocalmuffin]

Hello everyone! I wanted to share my accomplishments in 2023 before the year ends with a little bit of self reflection notes. You can enjoy everything in the read below.

Some fandoms highlighted include DGS, nintendo, and pokemon.

First off, this year has been hard for me. It's been a lot of self reflection and figuring my goals out after some became unattainable.

With that being said, I did accomplish a lot this year. I published my first recipe in a zine, finishing my first zine, improved my writing a lot, and picked up drawing once again. I also was able to get some actual help with some issues I have struggled with for years.

I want thank you all for your support. It means a lot that you enjoyed my artworks, writing, and ambition. Now here are my highlights for each month.

January: Foxtrot - An Asoryuu kitsune AU. One of the stories I took in when I was at my lowest last year and sparked a lot of my interest to keep writing. Plus Kitsune Kazuma.

February: Encore - A hassius story about motivation and being patient about the creation process. Though this was more or less my thoughts on this topic in general, this story literally inspired me to take my own advice and pick up drawing again.

March: The Memories that Lie - This was one I actually finished, but am glad I did. It's an asoryuu vampire story I was actually planning on scrapping, but ended up finishing anyway out of sheer stubbornness. To finish it, it took me completely restarting five chapters, but it came out a lot better than the original draft had mapped out.

April: This is when I took my hiatus and started to draw again in my free time. I was worn out, stressed, and collapsing under the pressure. This was my first piece that I posted.

May: Was a huge month for me. I launched the @blossominglovezine that you can enjoy here and published my first recipe in The Grand Adventure to Make the Perfect Cake for the @tgaacspringzine

June: I made my first icon! I was really busy this month planning for the trip of my dreams and doing some irl side work that ended up being permanent employment.

July: So I went to Las Vegas for a foodie tour. When I had a moment, I decided to draw the lovely Unicorn Goddess outfit.

August: This is when I did the Timmverse art study. This month was more of finishing up some logistics of zine work and getting a story out in the wild.

September: Goes to the Princess Peach Showtime piece I did! This piece really cemented my current style. And yes, I keep calling it Princess Peach Spotlight. Also wanted to mention I helped successfully launch the @dgscrimezine

October: Goes to my OC piece. CW for blood, but this piece was made for Halloween and the shading was really on point. I love this design for this OC.

November: I'm going with the fact I completed a ship week, asoryuu week. I got everything done at a reasonable time and was able to create so many fun pieces. 1 2 3 4 5 7. I had to skip day 6 because I ended up having an emergency. I also started pre-orders for my first for purchase zine, @desire-asoryuu-zine. This is still in pre-orders, so I wasn't sure if I was going to add it, but this is a big accomplishment for me.

December: I actually haven't been able to do much this month due to the holidays and getting distracted by Pokemon DLC, but I did draw this super cute Yuma!

Other highlights do include being accepted to multiple zine projects as a mod and contributor, which has been very exciting for me. You can check out that list here.

This upcoming year, I'll be helping with more projects and the @aawlwminibang events! I really want to do a personal project that I've been building up my skills for before pursuing, but now I think I'll be able to handle it. I won't announce it yet since it's still very much in development, but I hope I can in 2024.

Thank you all for your support this year. It has meant a ton.

[madfantasy]

Good morning

I have have barely awakened today and have no energy, nothing. I know I am in constant burnout and learning more and more about being on the spectrum means brought so much sense to my world and equal sorrow. I have tons of drafts waiting to be posted, pre written cuz I know I clock out on words pretty easily and can only communicate in specific times, something that I have never taken account of before.

Understanding now, my highs are the highest, and my lows are the lowest, and there's no in between.. I can't see a point of pretending to be okay having nothing to hope for, no work, no stability, no aspirations.

I didn't have work this month, my net is up on the 26th so there's no time, I suppose it doesn't matter in comparison to other issues.

● I love using tumblr, it's the only place I feel safe but it been years now and I still yet to gain followers. Tiktok flopped too and much more highly demanding and traitorous that I fell out off line even longer. And on twitter I do the post and dash because being there is absolute.. sigh

Just look at this. It was trending "boycottW*tsapp" I thought it was another breach of privacy, but no. New reminders to me that my life has no point because it's so willingly stupid & embarrassing and it should be kept a seceret

At least my highs are still high, I enjoyed drawing so much lately. Seeing my art gallery grow and hoping to draw with others too

● But even my art been plaguing me

The fact that I have to do something to hope for growth then work, is basically starting over again. I've always posted my ocs before and they never harnessed me any rewards, not until my one lucky post of a fanart got noticed.

I thought to start calling my art "dark art" ofc its a nod to Sev and his knowledge in em, is also a nod to the hek I gone through to keep drawing. Isn't that gothicly romantic? C:

At any rate, I have few more fanarts left to do, and I shall be focusing on that for now

Thank u for being with Mani still, I wish you the best of everything dears, sending all my love 🍀💛

8.30 am, 23.6.2023 - drinking my coffee conservatively xc

[readypanda]

Welcome to my blog!

Figured I should make a pinned post so people know what I'm about and whatnot

I'm an aspiring author and maybe game developer if I can ever get through all the godot engine tutorials (and learn how to make good pixel art). She/Her, not a minor. I'll go by pretty much any variation of my username (Red, Ready, Panda, etc. whatever floats your boat)

I mostly just dump whatever random posts I like in this blog. I tend to go through fandom phases so expect to see a ton of posts about one thing followed by radio silence (it's not that I stopped liking that thing---I just have fairly short brainrot turnover) I also have a sideblog, @readydrone, just for murder drones content, but it's fairly inactive as of late (see aformentioned brainrot turnover)

Some media I'm very normal about are:

Netflix's centaurworld (lives rent free in my head and probably always will. I CAN TASTE THE THEMES)

Epithet Erased and Prison of Plastic by Brendan Blaber (rick shades,,, among other things)

Wings of Fire by Tui. T Sutherland (DRAGONS)

Pokemon, unfortunately

The Owl House

Anything animated, honestly. I'm an animation enthusiast

etc. etc. etc.

writing stuff under the cut if you're just here for the fandom and memes

In terms of writing, some genres and tropes I like are:

fantasy (easy to read, also fairly easy to write given my style)

science fiction (idk I guess at the end of the day I just think robots and aliens are cooler than elves and dwarves)

drama (ooey-gooey character drama is my real specialty, fantasy and scifi are just flavors of the world tbh)

really great characters and character interactions

romance? sometimes? (bonus points if it's dual POV)

non-human characters (I just think they're neat)

I have too many WIP stories to list here, but I'll give a brief synopsis of some of the ones that are more important to me/relevant (since I tend to jump around which WIP stories I'm working on)

Fantasy drama about a human and a siren starting a band:

The human can speak to the ocean and plays the lute

The siren, due to an injury, can't talk or sing underwater and is fascinated by life on land

The first draft isn't finished yet

Dual POV but not a romance

the song that reminds me of this story: Moonshine by Caravan Palace

Science fiction fantasy drama about a cyborg and a flower nymph becoming bestiiiiiies (and maybe more 😳):

My oldest "finished" story. First draft is ~not very good~ so on and off I'm working on a rewrite to overhaul major story elements and prose

If you or a family member were sent this story in the past you may be entitled to financial compensation

dual POV like the other one, but this one has ROMANCE

the song that reminds me of this story: Blood by ANIMA! (this song lyrically fits better with the band story but I prefer its vibes for this story)

A post apocalyptic murder mystery with shapeshifting robots and one very mentally unwell girl:

Context? Nah

the song that reminds me of this story: Paper Boats from the Transistor soundtrack

that song doesn't really fit the murder mystery aspect but whatever

A monster romance (yeah this one's for the tumblr crowd) about a human volunteering for a marriage proposal from a distant kingdom to escape a toxic relationship:

This story is kind of a mess due to the heavy themes but I am actively writing it for whatever that's worth

Maybe if I wrangle it into a reasonable shape I'll put this on one wattpad idk it's giving wattpad

the song that reminds me of this story: Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John

If any of these sound interesting to you my ask box is wide open (please ask me about my stories)

[cozymochi]

🌻 >:)

IM FOUND ONE OF THESE MEMES IN MY DRAFts! Im gonna rank my experiences in the major fandoms i’ve engaged with.

🩵 YUGIOH! - Second longest running fascination. Upside!! Made life long friends. DOWNSIDE!! Was my first go at online engagement and in those 10 years so much happened that I still can’t help but feel a little sour. …Though ygo back in the day wasn’t good at tag comments, so I didn’t even know those were a thing for years until I branched out. 5/10. But grows to a 7/10 because i’ve settled into a niche area with so few people that it’s now a silly little club. 💕

🧡 Dragon Ball/Z - GENUINE CHAOS. Started off slow but intensified hard cuz get who got involved while Super was airing??? (I didn’t watch it lol), so the discourse and fighting was at an all time high. I have no idea how I even survived this in retrospect. My slight association with people netted me troll asks and my liking of Yamcha also set me up for those. …and frequent art reposting, and quite a few bizarre interactions. Pretty sure my art and edits have circulated more in latin america than I even know. This was also pre-tumblr purge so the amount of nsfw that got thrown my way is… something. That said!! Made also really good friends 💕 and DB/Z probably desensitized me to longer form discussions. 5/10 for insanity, but 8/10 for good reception and VERY PEAK and generous humans.

I think dbz hardened me.

💚 Invader Zim- started off fun (mostly irl with my friendo from days of YGO), but quickly devolved into territory that tested my patience. WHY ON EARTH THIS SERIES’ CONSUMERS had such a huge morality high ground base is beyond me. It’s this fandoms fault I learned about certain modern day online discourse terms and what instilled an irrational posting fear for a year lol. Fun at first and there’s super creative and receptive folk (then those people got kicked out) and left the most insufferable beings imaginable. There’s no in between. Shoutout to all 3 friends made who are still peak. 3/10, if I ever finish any remaining projects or decide to bite the bullet and show completed work, i’m not engaging again. The base just skews somewhere I can’t handle. Which is crazy given the ABOVE contenders have, on paper, done so much more.

dbz hardened me but iz weakened me. Which is probably why i need the formers bootcamp back. Don’t think I��m as fearful now, but i’ll still be salty.

💜 Twisted Wonderland - this is a work in progress experience. Will require further evaluation if all of the above experiences haven’t set my standards. Will stay in my corner. So far it’s 6/10 in vibes (they’re much calmer than the last one), tho I question how much of the interest is from what i do vs. what I did for others. Haven’t shared a ton of opinions yet and god knows lol we don’t want that /s. Still recovering from the former making me wanna just not do much. Baby steps I suppose.

💙 - Sonic The Hedgehog: This is a cheat, I have never interacted with the fandom directly (purely by happenstance, so thankfully no traces exist), but I have been into this since I was a child with no issues. So by default this is the best one. 10/10, didn’t engage, but I do lurk. Though all the stuff I see on tweeter isn’t exactly anything out of the norm for fandoms in general to do, so it weirds me out that people rag on this one for just kinda talking amongst themselves about innocuous things.

“omg this fandom is arguing over QUILL length ughhh can they never be pleased [30 yt videos about this drop]” ngl, this just feels like par for the course junk fandoms do. It really feels no different from DBZ where people go ham about the art style changes and which one is better. Or stupid shit in IZ where they fight about comics vs movie vs show. Like??? The only major difference here is that StH has more people in it (by the millions).

So literally nothing these folk do or say strikes me as anything more serious than what other fandoms already do??? Its just more outsiders see it then churn out content and perpetuate something worse from what’s honestly….pretty tame stuff. Maybe it’s just twitter’s setup given that’s all folk talk about.

[illuminatedcomics]

Today I remembered Mad Magic, and I made a LONG post about it. MM ran from November 2017 to May 2020 for a total of nearly 200 pages, my longest comic yet, not only in terms of actual continuous posting, but in development, as I have sketches and art dating back from 2011. Almost ten years of planning and drawing resulted in me having a big burnout that lasted a year and a half. It wasn’t MM fault that happened, and this post is sort of me coming to terms with what went wrong.

While the details and the higher concept shifted and changed multiple times, the heart of this comic always remained the same: there’re two girls, they’re roommates, and they live through a series of comedic horror adventures. 

Around early 2017, I combined this first draft with many newer ideas about high concept parody/deconstructions of Harry Potter: “What if a teenage Chosen one enters their adulthood and realizes they can’t top all the stuff they did as a kid?” and “What if one of those wallpaper background bullies that work as henchman for the main rival was the center of the narrative?” To be honest I was never a huge fan of Harry Potter, but still, I was in the right age group to see the movies as a kid, and read a few of the early books, so these concepts intrigued me.

Enter Mad Magic, the story of Joy Kaplan, former Demon Goat (that’s your house Slytherin), who after getting kicked out of school, ends up living a life of expedients, together with sassy Alix Peck, a punk girl that appears normal but has actually a mysterious past.

You know how they tell you “don’t make your first comic your big end all epic magnum opus”? Well, Mad Magic wasn’t technically my first attempt at a webcomic, but it nailed the too big for its own good part. When I finished planning it, it was going to be 17 chapters long (40 to 80 pgs each), with dozens of characters, twists, turns, action scenes, magic, time travel, vampires, elves, doppelgangers, lovecraftian gods, crossovers with other stories of mine, long haul plans a la Once Piece where that one character introduced in one panel in page 4 of chapter 1 was supposed to become the main villain of the story arc of chapter 12…

Considering the series ended after 4 chapters and a quarter, we know something broke down along the way. But what? Well first off MM was a ton of work. I structured the pages in a large euro-comic style, with four rows of panels, that fluctuated between 10 to 20 each, all full color. With a day job, completing a full page could take a couple of days or even a full weekend. So that was tiring, maintaining the schedule ate up a lot of free time, and whenever I missed an update or decided to take a brief hiatus I always regretted it and felt like crap about it.

But the biggest problem was a lack of general fulfillment and this absence was caused by my perceived inability to “find an audience”. There’re plenty of articles online explaining the causes of burnout, and one of the big ones is the problem with “reward”, when you don’t feel like the effort you put into something is worth what you’re getting in return.

There were people reading Mad Magic, there were people that seemed to love Mad Magic, but in my eyes, they were never enough… but what would’ve been “enough” anyway? What magic number would've made it worth it??? Ultimately, this junction between my inability to gather a larger interest, and the presence of this foggy, undescribed “number” of people that would’ve satisfied me caused the wheels to break down. I was letting things like subscriber counts, likes per page, pageviews and reblogs dictate how I perceived my own creation. If a page got fewer likes than average, I started wondering, obsessing what was wrong with it. 

The point is, after nearly three years of working on Mad Magic, doing my damnest to put out pages weekly, I was seeing absolutely no growth in reach or audience and I didn’t really know what I was doing wrong or if I was doing anything right in the first place. This stagnation led to stress, which led to losing pleasure in doing the comic in the first place, so that I was forcing myself to make pages, eventually leading to burnout and the complete loss in my desire to draw again. It took me a year and a half to get back into things, a period so nasty and bleak that even the idea of reading a comic made me queasy. The fact that this coincided with the global covid pandemic exacerbated the problems, but I think that even without that, it would’ve simply taken a bit longer to reach the same point of no return. I realize now this mentality was unfair towards the few readers I had, and to myself too.  I try not to worry about the idea of “finding an audience” anymore. I make the stuff I make because I want to, if I catch myself thinking “people won’t care about this” I nip it in the bud. I’m lucky enough that I don’t need to draw for a living, and considering artist’s spaces on the web seem to be constantly shrinking, the whole endeavor of finding a following online seems just a headache. I also try not to be bothered by the concept of schedules and updates.  I only draw when I want, when I feel like it, and it works. I look at stuff like Toxic Park, one of my current projects: in 2022, I produced around 80 pgs of story in two blocks, when the will and inspiration to do so hit me. That’s roughly the same amount of pages of Mad Magic I made in a similar period 2017/2018, by forcing myself to have at least one page ready every single week. So, the change in schedule or lack thereof, didn’t result in a change in output. Not to mention, that in both cases, I tried to develop other ideas simultaneously, and while with MM coming out that felt like crunching, at my leisure carefree pace I also made a 20 pages historical comic, Theo the Lucky, and nine more shorter comics, which are all around two to three pages worth of story (and you’ve seen posted on this blog). Simply put, I feel like I draw so much more now that I don’t cage myself in a mentality where “I must get this done before this completely imaginary deadline hits”.

I still hold the Mad Magic’s cast dear to my heart, they’re part of a ten year journey. I often try to think of ways of bringing it back, but continuing from the point where I left it off, where things were just starting to get interesting, doesn’t feel right. I may follow Osamu Tezuka’s Star System, where the same characters in personality and design are recontextualized in completely different stories. We’ll see.

Mad Magic is still up on tumblr where it was originally posted! And looking back at it, I think it still holds up relatively well. I lost all passwords and emails relative to that account so I can’t access it, but the entirety of the comic in its uncompleted state (I think some pages might’ve been weirdly flagged during the tumblr porn ban?) can still be read here:

@madmagic-comic

[procrastinationau]

IMPORTANT!

I realize that before I start publishing the rest of the current fic, I should put a note out to people who follow this blog.

This fic is pretty pivotal in the AU. There's a lot of plot and character development that happens in it, and most of that is in this back half of the fic that I just finished writing and haven't published yet. Some of it has been planned for a REALLY long time. So I have...a bit of a backlog of drafted posts (art, meta, memes) that I've had on standby for a while. And I wanna post them.

The plan is this. Once the fic has been fully posted, I'm going to wait 24 hours and then I will begin posting my drafted posts via the queue. ALL OF THESE POSTS WILL BE TAGGED WITH #AU SPOILERS. If you want to avoid spoilers, blacklist that tag.

I know I don't have a ton of active readers and I feel like people tend to read the chapters pretty quickly after they go up, so I'm hoping that the 24 hour grace period will give everyone enough time to catch up. This is 24 hours after the fic is completed.

Thanks for reading! I'm so excited to share some of the stupid shitposts I've been sitting on for almost a year lol.

[fountainpenguin]

hi my friend shared one of ur rancher posts with me on twt and i went INSANE- so i wanted to know if u had a twt? (cause thats where im most active for ranchers stuff) :0

?? My post has broken containment??? Incredible. If that's the one I just posted tonight then that's insane skldjf

No, I deleted my Twitter back in like... 2019 or 2020? I was only there to keep up with publishers and PitMad but then I never used it... never looked back, ha ha.

You're welcome to hang around my blog if you like (I use the tag #Team Rancher for all my Rancher commentary, reblogged art, or original art and I like to think I have a pretty good tag system so you can follow me if interested and blacklist stuff from other fandoms you don't care about; I try to talk positively about my fandoms, keep things clean, and not hate on anything since I like having a peaceful fanspace I can sink myself in and step away from the outside world :) But I'm multi-fandom, so I've got a mixed amount of stuff and it's okay if that's not for you).

-> If you haven't looked yet, I encourage you to browse my Team Rancher tag and check out some of those awesome artists and fellow fandom members!

I do have a very active AO3 account. I regularly post MCYT and non-MCYT content there, but you can specifically subscribe to my Pixels Imperfect series on AO3 if you only want emails for my MCYT content. It's a series, but it doesn't have to be read in order (It's just where I keep all my "morally gray pixel people living their best lives despite the outside world being total anarchy" stuff).

Specifically, tomorrow I'm posting the first part of a short story called Criminal Experience and Chapter 1 involves Tango visiting Mumbo's llama farm. Jimmy's not there, but maybe you'll still enjoy if you like Tango, ranch animals, and/or are curious to see if you like my stuff and my Tango portrayal :) [EDIT - Link]

-> I also posted some Jimmy content this past Tuesday; he makes his first big appearance in Chapter 6 of Dog's Life.

Again, totally fine if this doesn't fit what you're looking for since I'm giving you "Tango content" and "Jimmy content" but not specifically "Team Rancher content"... that's just all I've got right now! But I love talking about them and their characterization and you're always welcome to hit me up if you like!

I don't have anything that is specifically Team Rancher on my to-do writing list, but I'm working behind the scenes on a "put all the Life series into a single coherent timeline and making everything as canon as possible" project, so there will probably be some Team Rancher there. It's Scar-centric so I only have the Clockers nailed down right now, but the Ranchers were my faves so they'll probably exist in some shape or form in that series.

That series is called Neighborhood Watch, though I don't have anything posted for it on AO3 yet so I can't link you that one :')

-> If you are a Team Rancher fanartist/fanwriter and you use Twitter to post Rancher content, feel free to reblog or reply to this post and self-advertise! (But keep this post sfw, please)

[Psp psp even if you don't use Twitter, feel free to reblog or reply because I'm firmly a Tumblr user but I'd also love more Team Rancher in my life <3]

I'm glad you enjoyed my post! I really like Team Rancher... they are just very kind to each other and I could talk for ages about how they passed Scott's compatibility test with flying colors even though he was trying to rig it so they break up SLDKFJSLDFJ <3 Tango and Jimmy were just super kind to each other and incredibly comedic... Double Life was such a fun series. I miss them.

I've got a ton of Rancher fanart reblogs in my drafts/queue but I'm trying to space them out to avoid slam-dunking my followers, sldkfj. We love Team Rancher in this household. Thanks for stopping by!

[pumpkinblossoms]

OK, in the spirit of positivity, here are my top reads of 2022!

A bit in the way of context: I am a librarian, I read a lot, and, for better or for worse, I live and breathe books/publishing buzz/ARCs/etc. The list below is purely based on my own fully biased opinions, though those biases have nothing to do with whether I had early access to a title, a connection to the publisher, etc. and everything to do with whether a book is sad, gory, or gay. And thanks @explosionshark for suggesting I write this up!

DEAD COLLECTIONS by Isaac Fellman: holy fuck was this book good. The whole “trans vampire falling in love and solving a quiet, sad mystery in the archive where he works” angle is catchy, but this is definitely not the fluffy or straightforward story some people are after. I really loved how vampirism is depicted as a life-ruining weakness rather than a cool and sexy superpower. I also really loved the multimedia aspect of including forum posts and TV scripts and listserv chains.

BABEL: AN ARCANE HISTORY by R.F. Kuang: I think some criticisms of this one, like that it’s slow and repetitive and a little didactic, are founded. However, I couldn’t care less. R.F. Kuang excels at unhurried school stories that slowly and brutally dismantle themselves over hundreds and hundreds of pages, and the formula she establishes in the excellent Poppy War trilogy is perfected here. This is what actual dark academia looks like–The Atlas Six could never.

KISS HER ONCE FOR ME by Alison Cochrun: I used to read a lot of contemporary romance, specifically f/f romance, but after being burned over and over and over and OVER by bad books I’m incredibly selective about what I read and recommend in this genre. I gave Alison Cochrun a ton of shit for her incredibly mediocre debut, The Charm Offensive, but I am totally willing to say that she’s improved, and this book–while still definitely goofy and even grating at times–was probably the best f/f romance out in 2022 from a major publisher other than Delilah Green (which I read in 2021 and therefore did not include in this list, but also whose sequel sucked so much it honestly made me like the first one less). Do me a favor and don’t even read the back copy because it doesn’t make any fucking sense and will turn you off the book.

THE PALLBEARERS CLUB by Paul Tremblay: hoooo boy. OK. So this one got dismal reviews from the Goodreads crowd, but I believe fully and genuinely in my heart that everybody is wrong about it and should feel bad about how wrong they are. The thing is, Paul’s books are slow and atmospheric (are you sensing a theme to what kind of books I tend to like best) and there are no easy answers or moments of triumph or anything you might be led to expect via publisher-created blurbs or taglines. And going into a book with one expectation and having that expectation remain unmet is one of the quickest and simplest ways to have a bad-faith negative reaction to said book, in my personal experience. Like, could this book have been scarier? Definitely. But I loved it regardless, and I loved that the physical format of the book–Art’s memoiry fiction draft, or fictiony memoir draft, depending on your perspective, plus his best friend Mercy’s commentary written in red in the margins–is the sort of embodied story that I love because it fucking sucks to read on a screen or an ereader. You’re tied to the format, either print or audio (which I hear was well done for this one, though I haven’t heard it myself), and that’s great to me.

THE THOUSAND EYES by A.K. Larkwood: In my opinion this duology is criminally, WOEFULLY underrated. Csorwe is a grumpy butch orc warrior and she spends most of her time getting herself and her terrible frenemies out of trouble and also falling in love with a powerful sorceress. This book is the second one and is gloriously angsty and everyone gets middle-aged and sad and yet they all still pine for one another across time and space. I cried. I’m not sorry. It’s GOOD.

AN ARCHIVE OF BRIGHTNESS by Kelsey Socha: ok, full disclosure, this is my wife’s book, but it came out in August and it’s a lovely group of interwoven weird little gay stories. I would’ve loved it even if I didn’t share a mortgage with the author, I promise. Like, people live in houses made of scorpion corpses. Come on.

Honorable mentions: I didn’t really feel like getting too much into YA here, but I really liked CONFESSIONS OF AN ALLEGED GOOD GIRL by Joya Goffney, which was a really honest and interesting exploration of purity culture and religion; HOW TO EXCAVATE A HEART by Jake Maia Arlow, an interfaith winter holiday f/f romance (what a year for holiday romances, sheesh); and HELL FOLLOWED WITH US by Andrew Joseph White, a really gross and sad book that also manages to be incredibly, gleefully YA even as the protagonist morphs into a horrifying monster.

I also didn’t want to mention anything that hasn’t been released yet, so HOW TO SELL A HAUNTED HOUSE by Grady Hendrix and SOME DESPERATE GLORY by Emily Tesh are both out, even though both were SO GOOD and you should be foaming at the mouth to get your hands on them next year. And lastly, I didn’t think The Locked Tomb series needed any extra hype and if you haven’t picked it up yet it’s not like I’m going to convince you, so I didn’t bother saying anything about NONA THE NINTH although it was really very good.

And finally: I’m currently reading WHEN THE ANGELS LEFT THE OLD COUNTRY by Sacha Lamb which absolutely fucking rips so far, very much Good Omens meets Spinning Silver, but I haven’t finished it yet so it didn’t seem fair to count. I recommend it based on the first half, though!

PHEW ok that’s it! Send me your recs please!!

[nemirutami]

hi i was curious what fic you were refering to in your minato/akechi art :>??

It's a fic i've been writing on and off for a year now but i havent posted it anywhere yet haha.... unless?

In summary: It's about Akechi finding new work at a company called R.E.I (reliable, experienced, innovative) where Minato is the CEO (and widower) with a child Akechi comes to know as Rei (yep Minato named the company after his daughter). The fic focuses on all 3 influencing each other and helping each other cope/grow from their traumas but is also my biggest excuse to write cute scenes where Akechi gets to have an adopted daughter and be the dad he never got to be (he's terrible at it). If you're wondering "why would Minato hire Akechi" then don't worry. He has a very good reason. Minato hired Akechi because Akechi gave him shitty customer service and Minato took one look at him and said "I can adjust his attitude." now Akechi works for Minato bc he's an idiot. Most the fic is also me writing them comedically stupid and sad and very stupid. Oh, and I guess they kiss maybe. But really it's about broken people building a family w/o knowing. I made the fic as a joke and that's why it can't be named anything other than "Is it wrong to hit on my boss?" I've made a ton of art for it (some which I guess i've already posted alluding to the fic). I did make a cover sketch for it tho! There's a bunch of foreshadowing in the items on display (but it's too sketchy to make out I'm sure).

The 100k part of this fic is already up on patreon but I'm writing/editing the other 100K. So like, uh... 200+ pages of text and 29 chapters so far. In theory, the fic is already finished/has an ending, but I just need to fill in the gaps and tie plot points together.

If you're interested, I'll add the prelude/first chapter below the cut lmfao. It pretty much sets up the premise as tightly as possible in under 2K words. It has not been edited at all so take this abhorrently constructed first draft with no shame. You can judge my noodle words all you want but remember if you say a mean thing I will die.

Title: Is it wrong to hit on my boss?

Pair: Minake

Ch 1: That's not how this was supposed to go.

10 AM on the dot, to no one's surprise, he was flawlessly punctual as usual. Today was too important for missteps, and Akechi had carefully calculated each and every word he was going to use to land this job opportunity with one of Japan's biggest corporations in web development and online advertisement. Having worked at a low paying job for the most part (one with a boss that relentlessly attacked him and tried to convince him that he would amount to nothing, no less) didn’t prepare him for the call he received from R.E.I's founder about a new job opportunity. 

Cocky with confidence, he quit his job before the interview. 

After all, if this founder somehow went out of his way to request him, he must have done so with good reason.

With his hair tied back neatly into a ponytail and his shirt tucked beneath a more-than-a-little expensive looking business suit, he walked into the lobby, checked in, and got told to take the elevator up to the 3rd floor. He cocked his head curiously at the attendant before turning his gaze towards the elevator. Next to the elevator was a fire extinguisher for emergencies, and a metal plate outlining over 100 floors for the building. Naturally, there had to be some mistake. Floor 1 was considered the lobby, floor 2 was a storage for supplies and spare parts, and floor 3 was where their call center started. Their web developers were a fair bit higher up in the company, which made his directions only more confusing. What was a web developer supposed to do at a call center? While the thought of not having to fake a smile over the phone was comforting, the very image of having to do customer support 7 hours a day for the rest of his life put the fear of God in him.

"Pardon my rudeness, but there m-" Must be some mistake. The old lady at the counter was one step ahead of him and delivered her message with a sharp tone that left Akechi speechless.

"The founder's office is on the third floor," she interrupted her sentence with a huff, "-treat yourself to the coffee upstairs, you're gonna need it." and punctuated it with a dismissive wave of her hand. If more people hadn't entered the building and tried to take care of their own business, Akechi would have asked her to elaborate. But since he now for sure knew he was going to meet the founder, he decided not to make a scene.

"I… see. Thank you for the offer, but I must decline. I'm sure everything will go smoothly." But if they put him in a call center to provide customer support around the clock he was prepared to personally wire that black coffee maker into a homemade bomb and take down the whole building with him. While that thought crossed his mind, he smiled politely at the woman and took the elevator ride up.

Never in his life had he been so confused by a layout. He was aware of the building's size, but this was beyond ridiculous. The hallways almost looked like a maze, with paintings scribbled from wall to wall. Upon closer inspection, they looked like kids drawings. Either this was part of some PR stunt, or the founder was really into bright neon colors. If Akechi didn't hear the man on the other line himself and came here looking for a job, he'd expect to find a kindergarten at the other side of the many doors down the hall. His confidence was dwindling more and more with each step.

Once he reached the door he assumed would take him into the workplace where the founder was seated, he grasped at the handle only to find it locked. He blinked, and twisted the doorknob again, hoping it would open the door. When it didn't, he pulled a little harder until he heard a click from the other side, and noticed that the plate beneath the handle had the word "push" written in caps. Without thinking, he put far too much swing into his movement, and ended up smacking the poor sap on the other side that kindly unlocked the door for him, and the man's coffee poured right onto his suit and onto the floor in a loud mess.

"Ah, sorry!" He would have stayed and apologized properly if he wasn't at risk of running late. "If you give me a minute, I'll be right back and help you clean up!" and he was gone. He could have stayed and helped but chose to prioritize the meeting. In the end, that guy was out one cup of coffee and still had a stable income, whereas missing out on this interview might cost Akechi not only his career, but his livelihood. If this went south, he could wind up homeless. Unless he begged for his old job back.

No, the chill of winter would be less humiliating than going back on his hands and knees to the boss that not only demeaned him, but continuously plagiarized his work for his own benefit.

"Hewoo," In the midst of his early mid-twenties crisis, a soft voice spoke to him, but the only people he spotted were already head-deep in work. Another faint cry, this one, a bit more shy.

"Heo…" he turned his head down, and spotted a tiny girl hiding beneath a desk with her fist against her lips and her knees up to her chest. She looked about four years old, short curly hair with a clip-on to keep her bangs out of her eyes. Really, if she hadn't called out to him, he never would have spotted her in those shadows. He stared at her stupidly before turning his head up and asking if anyone brought their daughter to work. The girl shushed him, and got his attention once again.

"M, hidin…" 

"Ah," It was too early for a break, but he supposed someone might have taken some time off to call a responsible adult to come pick up their child from work. Still, he couldn't help but smile and crouch next to her, putting one finger over his lips with a whisper. "It's ok, I won't tell anyone." The little girl smiled so wide she was practically squinting. 

"Who r u…" He cocked his head slightly. Did she know most of the people on this floor? She spoke as if she knew he was a stranger. He shrugged it off. That can't be right. Must have been childish curiosity. 

"I'm Akechi Goro, and you?"

"Ake...ak...e...Aket…" She struggled and fumbled over her words, before she furrowed her brows with confidence and looked upset she couldn't yet pronounce his name.

"Gowo." He couldn't hold back a smile, and the little girl, now forgetting she's supposed to be hiding, shouts at him.

"Don't laff! That's mean!"

"Sorry!" His words said sorry, but his smile told her differently. At least, until his phone began beeping. It was now exactly 10 am.

"Sh-!" Too much in a hurry, he rushed to stand up quickly, and banged the back of his head against the table. He fell to his knees again, pushed down by the tabletop, and grabbed the back of his neck. The little girl, to no fault of her own, laughed at him without a shred of sympathy. Before he could get up on his feet, an arm patted him on the back.

"Hey, you ok?" He couldn't tell with his eyes closed, but the little girl mimicked the man's movements and reached her tiny hand out to pat Akechi's knee as if to comfort him. Before he could respond, he heard the man say "There you are!" followed by a tiny high pitched scream that honest to God was only giving Akechi a headache.

Still better than his old job, despite the abuse and trauma he's had to endure thus far.

When he opened his eyes, he saw the man that he accidentally slammed into squishing the little girl's cheeks, possibly as punishment.

"What did I tell you? You can't win."

"Mmmrmmmrrrr"

"Do you give up?" The child stubbornly stared him in the eye and only repeated her mumbling louder. The man sighed, but with the hint of a smile.

"Alright, go hide again." The joy in that little girl's eyes could part the skies on a cloudy day. She beamed and quickly ran off to hide elsewhere while the man covered his eyes and began counting. As soon as she was gone and he no longer heard the tip tap of feet, he got up and extended his hand towards Akechi.

"You look lost. Do you need any help?" This was humiliating. A kid laughing at him, he could handle, but a future coworker extending him his aid this early in their partnership was shameful. Especially since this was the same guy he left high and dry just moments ago.

"No, no, I'll be alr-" His voice was now much less sympathetic.

"Just take my hand." So much for debate. He didn't appreciate how everyone in this company cut him off mid-sentence, but took the other man's hand to get back up on his feet. As soon as he did, he got looked over rather thoroughly, a little too intensely to his liking.

"Doesn't look like you're bleeding, but if you're feeling dizzy, there's a nurse just two doors down to the left. She can examine you in case you've suffered any severe damage." His concern was flattering but unnecessary and sadly a waste of time.

"Haha, no worries. Actually... I need to get to the founder's office. Do you know where that is?" 

"Yes, but I wouldn't worry about t- Rei, don't climb the bookshelf! Junpei, will you-" 

"Aye, aye, boss! Come here you trouble bunny! How about you hop hop into bed and take a long looong nap? Man, uncle Junpei could use one too. I'll show you how it's done, like a pro!"

"Iori, sleep on the job and you're fired."

"Come on Philei, your dad is scary when he's talking to people that are not you!"

So much happened in the span of just a couple of seconds.

"...Rei?" He felt his blood run cold. "Her name is… Rei?" The man, somewhat confused that he was still standing there with a dumb look on his face, spoke as if this was basic knowledge Akechi should have known before stepping into the building.

"Of course, that's my daughter," he holds out his hand again, this time, expecting Akechi to shake it. "-and I'm the founder, Minato Arisato. And you are?"

Absolutely screwed.